Friday, April 14, 2017

April 14th

You'll find very few memorable top debuts this week … Percy Sledge hits the chart at #69 with "Out of Left Field" and Otis Redding premiers at #74 with "I Love You More Than Words Can Say" … but newcomer Engelbert Humperdinck will soon make a mark for himself here in The States as "Release Me" (a UK chart-topper for six weeks earlier this year) finally premiers on the US Chart at #76.  (The Guinness World Records British Hit Singles and Albums book refers to Engelbert this way … "Internationally popular cabaret entertainer and easy-on-the-ear vocalist".  I think most of his fans would tend to agree.)


Actually Hump made a pretty impressive mark on The British Chart … his first seven releases all made The Top Five … and two of those ("Release Me" and "The Last Waltz") went to #1.  "There Goes My Everything" and "A Man Without Love" both peaked at #2 … and "Am I That Easy To Forget" and "The Way It Used To Be" both peaked at #3 … not too shabby for a brand new artist breaking into the pop scene! 



Herman's Hermits' two sided hit "There's A Kind Of Hush" / "No Milk Today", issued just two months ago, is certified gold. 


The very first Bee Gees single ("New York Mining Disaster, 1941") is released in The United States.  Their record label (Atco) issues it with the following promotional tag line:   "The most significant talent since The Beatles".  (There just may be some truth to that statement … although little of us knew it or recognized it at the time.  In fact, several radio stations wondered aloud when this record first came out if might actually BE The Beatles in disguise!  Something tells me that's exactly what The Brothers Gibb were going for!) 



Depending on which source you believe, somewhere between 10,000 and 40,000 demonstrators march in protest of The Viet Nam War in San Francisco.  (We'll split the difference and call it "around 25,000".)